Oprah Says Old Racists ‘Just Have To Die’ To Further Our Nation’s Progress

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Oprah Winfrey gave her frank opinion about overcoming racism in America during a recent interview to promote the British release of Lee Daniels’ The Butler.

“It would be foolish to not recognize that we have evolved, in that we’re not still facing the same kind of terrorism against black people en masse,” she told BBC’s Will Gompertz. “Are there still places where people are terrorized because of the color of their skin, because of the color of their black skin? Yes. But there are laws that have allowed us to progress beyond what we saw in The Scottsboro Boys and beyond the – even prejudice that we see in the Butler.”

She went on to say that prejudice is a generational issue and old racists will have to die off to completely solve the problem.

“As long as people can be judged by the color of their skin, the problem is not solved,” she said. “I said this, you know, for apartheid South Africa, I said this for my own, you know, community in the South — there are still generations of people, older people, who were born and bred and marinated in it, in that prejudice and racism, and they just have to die.”

And as far as President Obama, the media mogul said he’s been a victim of racism and disrespect ever since he stepped into the Oval Office in 2008.

“Just the level of disrespect – when the senator yelled out ‘you’re a liar,’ remember that?” she pointed out. “I think there’s a level of disrespect for the office that occurs, and that occurs in some cases and maybe even many cases because he’s African-American.”